False Witness
by Lizzy aka hbndgirl
Summary: It was supposed to be a quiet street, no one around at that time of day. But then a fire department paramedic unit and a police unit both show up at just the wrong time. Now there are four witnesses who need to be silenced before they realize that there is more to this "accident" than meets the eye.
1. The Call

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Welcome! Thanks for reading! This is my first story for either_ Emergency! _or_ Adam-12 _. I had planned to write a story that was just_ Adam-12 _, but this one wouldn't leave me alone. I hope you enjoy it! Thank you in advance for following, favoriting, and/or reviewing! I always appreciate feedback!_

 _P.S. If you're reading/following_ Black Rose _, me posting this story does **not** mean that that one is going on the back burner._

 _ **False Witness**_

Chapter I

The Call

There was an odd assortment of candy spread out over the table at Los Angeles County Fire Station 51. It was mostly suckers with some sticks of bubblegum mixed in. Roy DeSoto might have found it a little strange when he walked in and saw it, but it was pretty well explained by the sight of his partner, John Gage, sitting at the table, meticulously counting the pieces of candy. For a moment, Roy debated whether he should even ask, but knowing Johnny, he'd tell him before much longer anyway.

"What's all this for?" Roy leaned against the table as he asked it.

Johnny started as if Roy had surprised him. "Roy, you have kids."

"Yeah. I've noticed that," Roy replied. It was starting to sound like Johnny was going to get him mixed up in something.

"How would you like the opportunity to really promote the paramedic program?" Johnny asked, using the tone he always used when he was trying to talk somebody into something.

Roy had only been working with Johnny for a few months. They had gotten to be friends while Roy had been assisting with the training class of paramedics that Johnny had been in, before the paramedic program had become legal in California. The bill that had accomplished that had only passed two months before now. Johnny and Roy had been working together ever since then. They got along well and made a good team, but Roy could already see that his partner had plenty of idiosyncrasies. Among them was a tendency to always try to talk other people into things.

"What opportunity would this be?" Roy was trying to play it safe.

"One of the schools asked the fire department to send over a paramedic to talk to the fourth graders about the paramedic program tomorrow," Johnny explained. "Charlie from C-shift was going to do it, but he volunteered to work overtime at 46 to get out of it. So guess who got stuck with it?"

"You?" Roy said, knowing the answer perfectly well.

"Yeah." Johnny let out a long breath. "But it's only for half an hour. I'll have plenty to say. That's not the problem. The problem is this." He gestured to the assortment of candy.

"What's the problem with that?" Roy asked. "What is that even for?"

"Charlie bought it to be prizes for a game he was going to play with the kids," Johnny told him. "The problem is that he didn't say what game he had in mind. You've got kids, Roy. What sort of games do fourth graders play?"

Roy sat down in one of the empty chairs. "Well, neither of my kids are in the fourth grade yet."

"How old are fourth graders, anyway?" Johnny asked.

"Ten, eleven," Roy told him.

Johnny rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "It's been a while since I was ten or eleven. What do kids that age do?"

Before Roy could reply, Chet Kelly walked into the kitchen and peered over Johnny's shoulder. "What's this? Your trick-or-treating loot?"

"Oh, cut it out, Chet." One thing John had learned quickly in the months that he'd been working at Station 51 was that Chet Kelly would take any chance he could get to rib him or play practical jokes. Although Chet didn't limit his teasing to Johnny, the paramedic was certainly his prime target.

"You're touchy this morning." Chet shook his head. "You shouldn't have stayed out so late last night trick-or-treating."

Roy stifled a grin while Johnny cast an annoyed glance at Chet. John didn't have a comeback for him, and that only annoyed him even more.

"The candy is for a talk on paramedics that Johnny is giving to the fourth grade at one of the schools in the area tomorrow," Roy explained.

"Oh, I see," Chet said. "Bribing the kids is the only way you can get them to listen to you. Do you think you have enough candy to get through the whole talk?"

"Kelly, will you just –" In mid-sentence, Johnny decided to switch tactics and ignore Chet instead. He turned to Roy. "Do you want to give the talk instead? You're better with the kids than I am. Besides, you were one of the first paramedics trained in the county. They'll think you're some kind of celebrity or something."

"Sorry, Johnny," Roy replied. "Joanne and I are taking the kids to the amusement park tomorrow. They'd never forgive me if I canceled on them."

"Looks like you're stuck with it, Gage," Chet said. "You know, I'm surprised they would have asked you. You'd think they'd want to give those kids a good impression of the paramedic program."

Johnny rolled his eyes. "Notice nobody ever asks you to give a talk about fighting fires."

"That's probably because I'm too busy actually fighting them," Chet replied.

Before the teasing could go on any longer, the alarm went off. At once, all three men headed for the door, but by the time they reached it, the dispatcher had already started speaking, giving the information that only the paramedic unit was needed: "Squad 51, woman down, thirty-six forty-two East San Luca Boulevard. Time out eight fourteen."

Johnny and Roy hurried into the squad while Captain Stanley acknowledged the call. Roy switched on the lights and sirens, and they pulled out of the station.

/

In another part of the city, two LAPD police officers, Pete Malloy and Jim Reed, were on patrol. Their shift had only started a little over an hour ago, and they hadn't yet gotten any calls. Jim hid a yawn behind the back of his hand.

"Maybe today will be a slow day," he commented.

"We get those every once in a while," Pete replied. He glanced at his partner who was yawning again. "You know, you should get more sleep when you're on duty the next day."

"Yeah. Tell me about it," Jim said wryly. "Jimmy's caught Jean's cold now, and I was up most of the night with him."

Pete nodded understandingly. "Jean's still not over her cold yet?"

"No." Jim shook his head. "It's really turned out to be a bad one. This is going on four days in bed."

"Maybe you'd better get her and Jimmy to a doctor," Pete suggested.

"I wanted to take Jean yesterday, before Jimmy came down with it," Jim explained. "But you know Jean. Never go to the doctor unless you're practically dying. I finally made her promise that if she wasn't better by tomorrow morning, I could take her and Jimmy to the doctor."

The officers had been working together for several years now. Pete had been Jim's training officer while he had been on probation, and the two had remained partners – as well as close friends – ever since then. In fact, when Jim's son, Jimmy, had been born two years earlier, he and his wife Jean had asked Pete to be Jimmy's godfather.

Jim rubbed his eyes wearily. At least, Pete hoped he was just tired.

"When you take them, you'd better have the doctor take a look at you, too," Pete commented. "If you're not careful, you're going to have to take some time off yourself."

"I can't afford the sick leave," Jim said. "That last cold used up practically all my leave time for the year."

"Uh huh." Pete nodded pointedly. "You can't afford not to take the time off. The last thing we need is for you to spread another cold like that through the whole division. And being your partner, I'd probably be the first one to catch it."

"Brinkman had the last one before I did," Jim pointed out. "Besides, I'm not going to catch this one, anyway."

Pete didn't reply, but he had his doubts.

His partner's non-reply gave Jim the opportunity to change the subject. "How are your camping plans coming along?"

"The only plan is to spend four days fishing and relaxing," Pete replied. "It's all planned out. Unless you double cross me and give me that cold."

Jim grinned. "That would be just your luck. You could wear a face mask while you're on duty in case you're worried."

Pete rolled his eyes. "You're a real comedian."

"Just goes to show I'm not sick if I still have a sense of humor," Jim said.

"That's debatable," Pete replied.

"That I haven't got the cold?" Jim asked.

"No, that you've got a sense of humor," Pete returned.

Jim grinned again, but he decided to let the matter drop for now. He really was worried about Jean and Jimmy being home alone and sick, and the idea that he'd catch the cold, too, was also concerning him. As he had said, he was almost out of sick leave for the year. Being the beginning of November, he didn't have much longer to hold out until the new year would roll around and he'd have more sick leave, but that wouldn't help now. What was worse, he had been feeling a tickle in the back of his throat ever since early that morning – or late last night, whichever it was - when he had been sitting up with Jimmy. He'd been trying to ignore it, but it hadn't gone away all morning. He cleared his throat, as if that would do any good. It didn't.

"I think I'll give Jean a call when we go on seven, just to make sure everything's all right and she doesn't need anything," he commented.

A few minutes later, the dispatcher's voice arrested their attention. Although they kept the volume of the radio turned down low, they had long ago developed a habit of noticing everything that was said over it without having to listen hard. Of course, it always especially caught their attention when they heard the number of their unit, 1 Adam-12, being called, which was what was happening now: "1 Adam-12, 1 Adam-12. Possible DB. Thirteen twenty-one Hardale Street. Cross-street East San Luca Boulevard. Ambulance is responding."

Jim grabbed the mic for the radio. "1 Adam-12, ten-four."


	2. The Accident

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you so much for reading, and thank you in advance for any follows and/or favorites! Thank you especially to Julie for reviewing chapter 1! I'm glad you're enjoying the story so far!_

Chapter II

The "Accident"

"East San Luca?" Johnny looked at the paper that Captain Stanley had written the address of their response on in confusion.

"That's what the man said," Roy replied.

"But that's in 127's area," Johnny reminded him. "It'll take us a good thirty minutes to get there."

"127 must be out on another response," Roy said. "It's not like this is the first time that something like this has happened."

"I just hope the patient can wait that long," John grumbled.

The only information they had was that there was a woman down. This could be anything from a non-threatening faint to a heart attack. If it was the latter, the patient might not last the twenty minutes that it would take them to arrive at the scene. Meanwhile, 127 might be off on a run that didn't amount to anything. This was one of the biggest problems the paramedic program had run into so far – they couldn't triage their patients, and so they couldn't always get to the people who needed them the most first. It was frustrating to know that some patients they might have saved would die because the paramedic unit nearest them was tied up on another case, perhaps even one that wasn't that serious. At the same time, they couldn't discourage people from calling, because the average person without medical training couldn't always tell whether something was serious or not. They could only hope that this response wouldn't turn out badly.

When they had been driving about twenty-five minutes, the dispatcher's voice came over the radio. "Squad 51, what's your ETA?"

Johnny picked up the mic. "LA County, Squad 51. ETA five minutes."

"Squad 51, cancel," the dispatcher said.

Roy switched off the lights and siren, and both paramedics took off their helmets. Roy turned at the next corner to go around the block and head back for Station 51.

"127 must have finished their run and been right in the area," he commented.

Johnny nodded. "Hope they make it in time. It'll have been close to thirty minutes either way."

They were in a part of the city that they weren't terribly familiar with. The street they had turned onto turned out to be one without many cross-streets. Before they reached one, the street made a ninety-degree bend to the left and began snaking up a hill, in exactly the opposite direction the paramedics wanted to go. Roy slowed the squad almost to a stop.

"I'll just turn around in one of these driveways," he said.

"Sure is a quiet neighborhood," Johnny remarked.

They had met less than half a dozen cars since they had entered this neighborhood, and the only pedestrians they had seen were occasional joggers. It was a little chilly this morning, and so no one was on their front porch drinking coffee or reading the morning newspaper.

As Roy was about to turn once again at the intersection where he had first turned off, he saw a car suddenly barrel out of a parking space about ten yards up the street. He slammed on the brakes as the car hurtled toward the intersection, but the front end of the squad was still sticking out into the intersection a few feet. The car swerved around it, but then ducked into its own lane in just enough time to hit a jogger whom Johnny and Roy had not noticed in the crosswalk until just this moment. The driver slowed down for a second or two while he turned around to look back out his window. Then he poured on his gas and sped away.

Johnny let out a cry when he saw the hapless jogger struck down. He grabbed the mic and reported what had happened, requesting an ambulance and police to meet them at the location. Roy switched the lights back on and threw on the parking brake. Then they hastened out of the squad, grabbed the drug box, biophone, and other equipment that they would need, and went to the patient's side.

It didn't look good. The patient, a middle-aged man, had already lost a considerable amount of blood, even in the few seconds that had passed since the accident, and he was completely motionless. Johnny was trying to find a pulse when a police car pulled up.

"We saw what happened," the officer on the passenger side of the car said. "Do you need help?"

"We can take care of things here," Roy replied.

The officer nodded, and immediately the police car went off in pursuit of the fleeing hit-and-run vehicle, which was already out of sight. Roy turned back to Johnny.

"How's he doing?" he asked.

"He's dead." Johnny rocked back on his heels in frustration. He saw a lot of deaths on this job, but it was something he would probably never get used to. A minute ago, this man had been alive and well, just out for a morning jog, and now he was dead. John and Roy had been right there when it had happened, too, and there was nothing they could do. It didn't seem fair.

Roy had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach for all the same reasons, plus one more that was even worse. He couldn't help feeling that he'd caused the accident. After all, the hit-and-run car had been swerving to miss the squad, which had probably hidden the jogger from the driver's view. It was true that the driver had been speeding and had run a stop sign, but none of that could absolve Roy of the part he had played in it, however small it might be.

\\\\\\\\\

"We're about five minutes from the address now," Jim said, watching the names of the cross-streets. "As long as we don't hit any traffic, but this neighborhood's pretty quiet this time of day."

Pete nodded, gearing himself up for what was ahead of him. Dead body calls were usually unpleasant, to say the least. His strategy was to prepare for the worst, take whatever came, and not try to speculate how a call like this might turn out before he got there.

Jim was thinking along the same lines, but making small talk made things easier on him, even if it was just about how far they were from the address or about the traffic. Pete knew about both as well as he did, but talking broke the tension.

"It's faster if you turn at that intersection up ahead," Jim pointed out.

Again, Pete nodded, having already intended to take this street. He had, after all, been patrolling this area longer than Jim, and it wasn't very likely that he wouldn't know it as well.

Pete had just turned the corner when both officers heard a squeal of brakes farther down the block. Up ahead, they saw a county fire department rescue unit stopped a few feet into the next intersection. A blue Chevy Malibu was swerving around its nose, despite having a stop sign. The officers had just looked up in time to see the Malibu strike a man in the crosswalk and drive off, only slowing for a few seconds while the driver glanced out his window. Immediately, Pete switched on the lights and siren and headed for the scene, while Jim grabbed the mic to report to the dispatcher what had happened. It only took them a few seconds to reach the scene of the accident, but already the two firemen paramedics from the rescue unit were at the victim's side with their equipment.

Pete slowed the car just long enough for Jim to roll down the window and say, "We saw what happened. Do you need help?"

"We can take care of things here," one of the firemen replied.

Jim nodded, and Pete took off in pursuit of the Malibu, which had turned the next corner. Naturally, by the time the officers rounded it, the car had made another turn and was still out of sight. They cruised up the street for several blocks, both officers keeping a sharp eye out for any sign of the car. It was nowhere to be seen. Those few seconds that they had taken to slow down at the scene of the accident had cost them more than they had expected.

"Did you get a license number?" Pete asked as he made a U-turn to return to the scene.

Jim shook his head. "It was too far away. I couldn't make it out. All I could see was that they were California plates."

"Same here," Pete replied. "It was a blue '68 Malibu, but that only narrows it down to a few thousand cars."

When they reached the scene of the accident again, they saw right away that the prognosis on the victim wasn't good. Rather than being busily at work trying to save him, one of the paramedics was sitting on the curb with his head in his hands while the other was leaning with his back against the squad and his arms crossed in front of him, looking equally downcast. Pete parked the car, and he and Jim went to talk to the two paramedics.

"How is he?" Pete asked the red-haired one who was leaning against the squad, although he already knew the answer.

"He was killed immediately." The dark-haired paramedic stood up as he said it. "There was nothing we could do. We have an ambulance on the way. For all the good it'll do."

Jim cleared his throat as he took out a pen and pad of paper to start writing down the report. He could still feel that tickle in the back of his throat, but now wasn't the time to worry about it. He held out his hand to the dark-haired fireman. "I'm Officer Jim Reed. This is my partner, Pete Malloy."

The fireman shook his hand. "John Gage. My partner over there is Roy DeSoto."

"We were down the street when the accident happened," Pete explained. "We'll need you two to give your statements."

As was usual procedure, each of them took one of the witnesses out of earshot of the other to question him to make sure his statement wasn't influenced by what the other said. Jim questioned John, while Pete talked to Roy.

"Can you tell me exactly what happened?" Jim asked.

"Yeah." Johnny shook himself, trying to rid himself of the shock, anger, disgust, and empathetic sorrow that he'd been fighting ever since the accident had happened. Getting down to business in the matter would help, but it couldn't all be dispelled in a moment. "We were making a left turn at this intersection here – um, Roy was driving – when all of a sudden that car came barreling down the street. Roy hit the brakes, and the car swerved around us and hit that pedestrian right in the crosswalk. He slowed down for a second, but then he just kept on going."

"Were you on your way to a response at the time or were you coming back from one?" Jim asked, quickly jotting down what John said.

"We had been on a response, but it just got canceled," Johnny replied. "We were just turning around to head back to the station."

"What about the car? Can you describe it?" Jim questioned next.

Johnny nodded. "It was a blue Chevy Malibu. I didn't see what year and I didn't get a good look at the license number. I just saw the first three letters – LRK."

Jim noted that information down eagerly. It would be a big help. "What about the driver? Did you see him at all?"

"No –" Johnny started to say, but then he stopped himself. He turned to face the spot where the car had been as it had driven off and held up both hands to gesture toward it. "Just before he sped off, he slowed down for a second and looked back. I got a pretty good look at his face."

"Can you describe him?" This just might be an easy case after all, Jim thought. When they caught the driver – which shouldn't be too hard between the description of the man, the description of the car, and the partial license plate – it would be a simple thing to make a case against him with John Gage's testimony.

"He was white, dark hair that was kind of long, and he had a narrow face." Johnny tried to think if he had seen anything else, but he couldn't remember anything. "That's about all I saw."

"Do you think you would recognize him again if you saw him?" Jim asked.

"Yeah, I think so." Johnny rubbed his chin as he began to take notice of a thought that had been growing in his mind the last few minutes. He had nothing to lose, broaching the idea to the police officer. It might even help the investigation. "You know, I can't help thinking there was something strange about this accident."

"How so?" Jim looked up intently at the way John had emphasized the word "accident."

Johnny turned again to face the intersection. "That driver had to swerve pretty fast to hit that guy." He used his hand to mimic the car's path. "He should have missed him – unless this wasn't an accident, after all."


	3. Curiosity

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read this story and for any reviews, favorites, and/or follows! I appreciate any or all of them! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp and Julie for your reviews on chapter 2!_

Chapter III

Curiosity

"Do you think there's anything to Gage's idea that the accident wasn't really an accident at all?" Jim asked, hours later in the day when he and Pete were nearing the end of their watch.

"Could be," Pete agreed. "The detectives will get that straightened out after they pick up the driver."

"Yeah. I guess so." Jim couldn't help feeling a little disappointed. One of his biggest complaints about his job was having to turn over the interesting cases to detectives, after which he may or may not learn how they turned out. In this case, of course, being both a witness and a responding officer, he would testify in court, but it could take months before the case would go to court. "Still, I think they should look into the victim's background and see if they can find any motive for someone murdering him."

"I'm sure they will if they think there's anything to the idea that it was homicide," Pete told him. "Why are you so worried about it?"

Jim shrugged. "Just curious. We were so close when it happened, and we couldn't stop it. We couldn't even catch the driver. It's been bugging me all day."

"Things like that happen," Pete said. "You've been on the job long enough to know that." Despite his words, it was bothering Pete, too. It was beyond him to guess whether the hit-and-run had been accidental or intentional, but there was something odd about how quickly the driver had disappeared. True, he had had a small head start, but they should have still been able to spot him somewhere. Pete knew that during their lunchbreak, which they had taken at the station because they were still filling out paperwork from the accident, Jim had not only taken a few minutes to call Jean and check on her, but he had also done a little bit of digging on the victim, who had been identified as Roger Winfall. "What did you find on Winfall?" Pete asked.

Jim glanced at Pete in surprise, as he hadn't told him of his investigation into the dead man, but he quickly shrugged it off. "I pulled his record. He was clean except for a few tickets over the years that he always paid. I didn't find anything else on him."

"Well, I doubt he got killed because of a ticket," Pete said.

"No," Jim agreed. "If there's anything to the idea that this was homicide, those tickets don't give any answers."

Pete glanced at his watch. "Looks like it's about time to head for the barn."

"Good." Jim covered a yawn with the back of his hand. Having been tired when he had begun work that morning, he was doubly tired now. Worse still, though his sore throat had gotten no worse throughout the day, it also hadn't gotten any better. He was sure by now that he was going wake up with Jean's cold the next morning.

They had just gone into the station and were on their way to the locker room when they happened to run into Detective Sergeant Harmon, who was handling the investigation of the accident. Jim couldn't resist stopping him to ask about it.

"Any news on that accident this morning, Sarge?"

Harmon crossed his arms. "Yeah. We found the car, we think. We're still waiting on the lab tests to verify it one hundred percent, but it looks likely."

"That was fast work," Pete commented. "You have an ID on the owner, then?"

Harmon nodded with a sigh. "That's the problem. The car's a West LA stolen. It was taken from a parking lot day before yesterday. We got some good prints off it, so we might get lucky anyway. More likely, they'll just belong to the owner."

"Where'd you find the car?" Jim asked.

"Davis and his partner spotted it while they were on patrol," Harmon told him. "The license matched the partial that you got from that fireman, and the front end was dented with some bloodstains. We knocked on a few doors, but nobody claimed the car and nobody saw the driver. It looked like he'd dumped it. The driver would have to be pretty dumb to abandon a car like that and leave any fingerprints or anything like that behind. But you never know. Like I said, we might get lucky."

"Let us know how it turns out," Jim said

"Will do," Harmon replied.

/

Johnny dug through the fridge at Station 51, trying to find something to eat. He and Roy had had calls back-to-back for the last few hours, starting with one that had pulled them away right before lunch. It was now six o'clock in the afternoon, and so Johnny was justifiably starved. He pounced triumphantly on a container with the lunch leftovers inside.

"You guys sure didn't save much for us," he commented as he took the lid off.

"You don't want that," Marco Lopez said as he stirred something on the stove. "It'll spoil your appetite for supper."

"Marco, right now, nothing could spoil my appetite," Johnny replied. He held out the container towards Roy, who was sitting at the table, resting his chin in his hands. "You want some?"

Roy started, as if the question had caught him off-guard. He mumbled, "No thanks," and then, not wanting to be part of any further conversation, he headed toward the dorm.

"What's the matter with him?" Marco asked.

"Oh, it's that accident this morning." John retrieved a fork from the silverware drawer. "It's been bugging him all day. He thinks we caused it."

"The police must not have thought so." Chet Kelly glanced up from the magazine he was reading. "What makes Roy think so?"

"Just the way it happened and everything," Johnny said with his mouth full. He swallowed and continued with the thought that had been on his mind all day – at least, whenever he'd had time to think at all. "It doesn't make sense. If anything, we should have prevented that accident."

Chet scoffed. "Yeah. Sitting in the middle of an intersection is a great way to prevent accidents."

"I mean that particular accident," Johnny explained. "The guy might have hit us, sure, but with us right there, he shouldn't have been able to hit just the jogger."

"I don't know," Marco said. "Sounds pretty far-fetched to me. If he would have hit the squad, then both vehicles would have probably still hit the jogger."

"But he didn't hit the squad," Johnny insisted. "That's the point. What I'm trying to say is that with the squad where it was, this particular accident couldn't have happened."

"But it did," Chet reminded him. "I don't see what's so hard to figure out about that."

"What if it wasn't an accident?" Johnny suggested, getting right down to what he'd been thinking. He had already told Officer Reed at the scene of the supposed accident, and he'd been turning the matter over in his mind ever since then. He was more convinced of it now than ever.

"I think you've finally completely lost it, Gage." Chet shook his head. "What could it be if it wasn't an accident?"

"It could be murder," Johnny pointed out.

Marco gave him an incredulous glance. "You're kidding, right?"

"No, I'm not." Johnny paused long enough to take another bite, and then he set the food down on the table. He went over to the blackboard that the captain used for drills sometimes and began sketching what had happened that morning. "Look. The squad was here, and the jogger was right here. The driver came out of nowhere, ran the stop sign, swerved around us, hit the jogger, and then drove off. First point, why would have he swerved like that if he wasn't trying to hit the jogger on purpose? Second point, the two cops were down at the next block, and this guy didn't pass them. That means there's only one place he could have come from – he must have been parked and came screaming out of his parking place right when he knew that jogger would be passing by. The hit-and-run man could have planned it out. The victim could have easily gone jogging every morning at the same time and in the same place. The guy could have meant to make it look like an accident, and then we just happened to get in the way." He turned away from the board to look at Chet and Marco. "What do you guys think?"

"I think you don't have the brain capacity to play Sherlock Holmes," Chet said.

"Very funny, Chet." Johnny walked back to the table to pick up the lunch leftovers again and continue eating. "I'm serious. If I'm right, we could have a very big problem on our hands."

"How so?" Marco asked.

"Roy and I were witnesses," Johnny explained. "What if the murderer decides to make sure we don't talk?"

"Then he's a little late," Chet pointed out. "You've already told the police everything you know, which isn't much."

"Besides, things like that only happen in the movies," Marco added.

"And if it was murder," Chet continued, "how would the murderer know that you know it was murder? He went to a lot of trouble to make it look like an accident, _if_ it really was a murder."

Johnny couldn't very well argue with any of those points, but he wasn't about to give up his theory. "Either way, I'll sleep easier when they pick this guy up."

Chet shook his head. "If I know you, Gage, you're not going to let any of us sleep until they pick him up."


	4. Deadly Recognition

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you so much for reading this story! Thank you also for reviewing, following, and/or favoriting it! I always appreciate your feedback and support! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp for your review on chapter 3!_

Chapter IV

Deadly Recognition

This was not how Jim had planned to spend his day off. He had expected to take Jean and Jimmy to the doctor in the morning, and then in the afternoon try to get some work done while they rested. There was plenty of work that needed done. The drain in the kitchen sink was plugged again, there was a creaky floorboard on the stairs, and the lawn was beginning to look like a jungle since Jean had not been well enough to mow it in almost a week and Jim hadn't been home.

It looked like all of that would have to wait a little longer. Jim's sore throat had developed overnight into a flu just as bad as Jean's had been. Jean, on the other hand, was feeling a bit better. Even so, she agreed to go to the doctor with Jim and Jimmy, but they couldn't get in until afternoon. So, for the morning, there was nothing to do but lie in bed and try to read.

Focusing on the words on the page took too much effort, and Jim found that his interest kept being taken away from what he was reading. He just couldn't stop thinking about that supposed accident the day before. He had thought at first that the fireman's idea that the hit-and-run had been intentional was a little far-fetched, but the more he thought about it, the more sense it made. It was odd that the driver had swerved around the paramedic squad to hit the jogger, but he'd seen odd things like that happen in car accidents before. But between that and the car being abandoned and stolen, the idea that it was homicide was starting to make a little more sense. The whole thing must have been planned.

There wasn't anything he could do about it now, he told himself. The detectives knew as much about it as he did, and being a patrol officer, he wouldn't be assigned to investigate it. Besides, the way he felt right now, the case would probably be solved by the time he was back to work. He needed to just try to forget about it, but that was easier said than done.

/

"All right." Johnny clasped his hands nervously and tried to smile, but the sea of bored faces looking at him was less than encouraging. It was only five minutes into his talk, but it felt like it had been forever. Charlie from C-shift really owed him for this. "Now that I've, uh, told you what – a little bit what paramedics are, I'll tell you what we do." He wasn't sure if that made any sense, but since the kids didn't even seem to be listening, it probably didn't matter.

Usually when the fire department did an educational talk like this for one of the schools, they would bring some of their equipment and a fire engine, which usually kept the kids' attention. The teacher for this particular class, however, apparently tried to have a guest come into the classroom at least every other week to talk and, for the sake of uniformity, he said, he wanted all of these talks to happen in the classroom. That was why an off-duty paramedic had been asked to do this and why Johnny didn't have any equipment to show the kids. Johnny only had to get through half an hour, but considering that it had only been five minutes so far, it might as well have been for eternity.

Two of the boys in the back began whispering to each other. The teacher, a stern, middle-aged woman who had only introduced herself as Mrs. Farley, immediately interrupted Johnny to tell them to be quiet.

"Be respectful!" she snapped. "Mr. Gage didn't come to visit our class just so you would talk over him."

One of the boys raised his hand. Mrs. Farley begrudgingly gave him permission to speak.

"I was just telling Phil that I already know what a paramedic does," the boy said.

Mrs. Farley looked like she was about to tell him to be quiet again, so Johnny intervened. "You do? What's your name?"

"Sam," the boy replied.

"Well, Sam," Johnny said, "have you seen paramedics working?"

"Yeah," Sam told him. "I saw you working. Old man Winfall – I mean, Mr. Winfall got hit by a car yesterday, just down the street from my house. I saw you and another paramedic there."

"There's no need to talk about things like that," Mrs. Farley started to say.

"You saw that?" Johnny asked, his curiosity about what had happened making him forget all about the talk he was supposed to be giving. "You saw the accident?"

"I didn't see it, but I heard it," Sam said. "I was sick so my mom let me stay home. I was up in my room, and I heard the crash and then all the sirens. My dad says Mr. Winfall had it coming to him. He was a real mean old man."

"Enough of that, Sam," Mrs. Farley rebuked him. "Please continue your talk, Mr. Gage."

"Oh, right." Johnny was half-distracted through the rest of the talk, but so was his entire audience. The revelation that the victim of the "accident" had been disliked by his neighbors seemed just another piece of evidence that the incident had been intentional.

Fortunately, the distraction helped to make the next twenty minutes go by faster. Whether the talk had been a disaster or not, Johnny couldn't have said. Probably the kids listening could have said either. Whatever the case, that wasn't the first thing on his mind. He was focused far more on the "accident".

From the few months that Johnny had been working with Roy, he could already see that things like this hit hard for Roy. John couldn't blame him. After all, as hard as he'd tried yesterday that there was no way they could have caused the accident, he had to admit to himself that that wasn't entirely so. If it had been an accident, the driver of the other car had clearly been at fault for speeding and running the stop sign, and he hadn't helped his case by making it into a hit-and-run. Still, if the squad hadn't been there and the driver could have seen the jogger, Winfall, he might have been able to swerve to miss him. On the other hand, if the "accident" had actually been on purpose, whether the squad was there or not wouldn't have made any difference. Johnny needed to find out somehow.

That was what he was thinking as he walked out of the school and was suddenly accosted by a man who looked vaguely familiar.

"You're the paramedic who was giving the presentation to the fourth grade, right?" the man asked. When John replied in the affirmative, he went on. "That's some program, the paramedics. How did you get involved in it, anyway?"

"I just signed up for the training," Johnny replied, a little confused by the man's effusive interest.

"They must pay quite a bit extra for something like that," the man continued.

"Actually, no. They pay us the same amount as a regular firefighter," John said. "Excuse me, but have we met?"

"You don't recognize me?" the man asked. "I guess you wouldn't. I was just a bystander anyway a few days ago at a car accident. I thought I saw you there. I could be mistaken."

"Yeah, that could be." That would explain why the man looked familiar, but Johnny had the feeling that there was more to it than that.

"I'll let you get on your way," the man said. "Are you on duty today?"

"No," Johnny said.

He was a little relieved to get away from this stranger. His effusiveness was more than a little uncomfortable. Besides, Johnny had a possible murder to think about.

He stopped short. That was it. The man who had just talked to him. He'd cut his hair and between that and the brief glimpse Johnny had had of him the other day, he hadn't completely recognized him at first, but he was sure now. The man who had just spoken to him was the driver of the hit-and-run car.

Johnny looked all around to see where the man went, but he was already out of sight. John spotted a public phone booth just down on the corner. He trotted to it, pulled out a phone book, and began looking for the number of the police without bothering to close the door of the booth. A moment later, he felt someone standing right behind him. He turned his head and found himself face-to-face with the man he had just spoken with a moment ago.

"I thought you'd recognized me," the man said. He pulled his hand out of the large pocket of his coat just long enough for Johnny to see that he had a gun in it. "I figure that other fireman and those cops must have seen me, too. That's something I can't just leave alone."

"Hey, man," Johnny tried to reason with him, "what are you trying to get from this?"

"I'm trying to stay out of jail, idiot," the man practically growled. "There wasn't supposed to be anyone around that time of the morning. Then you and those others had to show up. Well, I'm going to make sure none of you are going to be able to identify me."

"I don't think any of the others saw you," Johnny told him, truthfully enough.

"I'm going to make sure of that," the man said. "But I'm going to have to find them first, and I don't think they'll be quite so easy to find as you were." He jerked his head to indicate to John to follow him. "You can help me."


	5. Kidnapped

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read this story and for following and/or favoriting it! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp, Julie, and Jo for your reviews on chapter 4!_

 _I'm going to be away for about a week, and I can't guarantee I'll have Internet during that time. So, if I don't update for a week or so, I'm not dead and I'm not abandoning this story. Thank for your patience!_

Chapter V

Kidnapped

Johnny didn't like guns at the best of times, but having a loaded one pointed straight at him was even worse. There was no doubt in his mind now that the "accident" had been intentional, but he would rather not know, honestly. He'd decided the only thing he could do was cooperate, so he had let the murderer lead him to a car and drive him away. It was impossible to tell where exactly they were going, and John was determined, if he got the chance, not to wait around to find out. His biggest advantage was that his captor insisted on driving himself, and so he was more than half-distracted.

Maybe John could try to talk him out of this – whatever the guy was planning, exactly. "The cops don't even know who you are, man. There's no way they can find you."

"Like I said, I'm making sure of that," the man said. "You, that other fireman, the two cops – you're the only ones who saw. If I can make sure none of you will talk, then the cops won't find me."

"Seriously, man." Johnny tried not to sound frightened or desperate, but he couldn't quite make the pitch of his voice entirely natural. "I was the only one who saw your face. The others only saw the car."

"Yeah, and I dumped that." The man smirked. "None of this helps you any, though. I can't wait to see what you come up with for why I should let you go."

Johnny took some time before responding to this. He needed to think through his approach carefully. If he tried to talk this guy out of this too directly, he wouldn't listen. There had to be some way he could ease into it.

Noticing his prisoner's failure to reply, the man let out a laugh. "Nothing to say to that, huh? Might as well keep it that way. Whether keeping you from talking before was necessary or not, it definitely is now. As for what those others saw or didn't see, nothing you say matters too much to me. You wouldn't tell me the truth either way, so I'm not taking any chances. I'm still going to round them up, and you're going to help."

"Hey, man, I can't do that." John shook his head ever so slightly. "I don't know where they are. I never even saw the cops before yesterday."

"You know where your partner lives," the murderer reminded him. "That'll make it pretty easy to find him. As for the cops, you must have heard their names. That would be a decent start to tracking them down."

Johnny looked ahead at the street. It didn't look like there was going to be too much chance of talking this guy out of anything. He wondered exactly how this guy intended to make him talk. Whatever his plan was, it obviously wasn't good. Johnny shuddered.

He'd been in plenty of dangerous situations before. Risking his life was a frequent occurrence, first when he'd worked as a regular firefighter, then as a rescue man, and finally now as a paramedic, but there was always a point to all of that. He'd always been trying to rescue someone else. But not this time. This – This was just pointless. Stupid, even. It didn't make sense, even for the murderer. He could have lay low, kept his head down, and probably would have escaped. He was taking a big chance coming out in the open like this. Of course! This could be a way to get through to him.

"You know," Johnny said, "there were a lot of people around at that school. They might have seen you grab me. Now you've just got an even bigger problem."

There was nothing much the murderer could say to this. Frustrated and angry, he jabbed the gun that he was still holding in his right hand at Johnny. "Shut up! Not a single thing you've said so far has helped you any."

Johnny swallowed. All right, maybe that wasn't a way to get through to him. There had to be something else he could try. He watched which way they were going as he thought about it. The driver turned onto a street that Johnny was familiar with. It led out of the city and up into the hills. That was just great. They'd be miles from any help.

"You know, kid, you'll be a lot better off if you just tell me what I want to know," the driver commented after a long pause. "Just tell me the names of the two cops and your buddy's address, and it'll save us both a lot of trouble."

"Yeah, well, I'm not so sure about that," Johnny replied. Now that he'd had a little bit of time to think, he was starting to formulate a plan.

"I give you my word, you'll regret not telling me far more than you'll regret telling me," the man said.

"Oh, I wasn't talking about me." Johnny needed to calm himself, sound natural. "It wasn't me I was talking about. I was thinking about you. It won't be as easy to catch the others." Sensing the man's anger rising again, John hurriedly added, "I mean, come on. Two of them are cops, and they'll be armed, even if they're off-duty. Plus, they're trained to watch out for people sneaking up behind them and stuff. You've got a plan, don't you?"

"Well." The kidnapper's jaw stiffened and he looked straight ahead. "Sure, I've got a plan. I've got a plan and I've got help. You don't think I'd try something like this without either, do you?"

"Oh, well," Johnny floundered. He was dismayed by the revelation that this man had help. If he'd been by himself, there would have been a better chance of escaping from him. "Of course, you wouldn't try it without a plan. That'd be a really dumb thing to do."

"Exactly," the driver said. "Obviously, I'd never try anything that dumb."

"Obviously," Johnny agreed. "You planned everything out pretty well this far. You had to be in just the right spot at just the right time to pull off the so-called 'accident' in the first place. You must have been parked down the street to come out of nowhere like that."

"Yeah." There was a note of pride in the driver's voice. "That's exactly how I did it all right. It was really perfect. Until you and that other fireman got in the way, that is."

"And then you found me pretty fast," Johnny continued.

The man nodded in self-congratulation. "That part was easy. You had that big '51' plastered all over the side of your squad. It wasn't too hard to find out the names of the guys who were working Squad 51 yesterday."

"That's really clever." Johnny was getting caught up in his act well enough that he sounded much more sincere and confident than he had before. "But how did you find out that I'd be at the school today?"

"It was too easy," the man bragged. "You see, I just went on down to Station 51 this morning and fed the guys there a line about you and DeSoto responding to a call that I was sick. I said I'd been feeling too out of it yesterday to thank you two properly or even to get your names, so I thought I'd drop by and see when you were supposed to work next. They not only told me that, but they also told me about your presentation at the school this morning. It was beautiful. See, I thought I'd wait till your next shift, and then place a phony call for you two to respond to and I'd grab you when you came, but this works even better. I'll only have to deal with one of you at a time and I won't have to risk someone else responding."

"Like I said, that's clever." It was all Johnny could do to keep from sounding at all sarcastic. The murderer's plan was anything but clever. All the men on B-shift could recognize him now, and they'd certainly put it together that the stranger asking about Johnny and Roy who had been directed to the place where Johnny had disappeared from had to have something to do with it. This guy was dreaming if he thought he could capture Roy or either of the cops. The element of surprise had been the only reason he'd been able to capture Johnny. John could only hope that this fellow would make some more mistakes soon and lead the police straight to Johnny before it was too late.

/

It was eight in the evening, but Nurse Dixie McCall's day was far from over. In addition to caring for patients and assisting doctors, there was what seemed like a never-ending stack of forms to fill out at the nurse's station and then it was also the time of the week when she had to work out the new schedule for the nurses. At least, right now, things were fairly quiet. Perhaps a little too quiet, she thought, as she noticed Jennifer Caley, one of the new nurses, just standing across the hallway like she was waiting for something.

She was about to say something to Jennifer when someone else caught her attention. "Hi, Miss McCall."

It took Dixie a moment to recognize the young man who had hailed her without his uniform. Even with his uniform, she had only seen him a few times, since he usually worked in a different district. "Jim Reed." She smiled. "It sounds like you've got some kind of a cold."

Jim nodded. "All three of us do." He was with a young woman and was holding a small boy whom Dixie judged to be about two. He introduced them to her. "This is my wife, Jean, and our son, Jimmy. Jean, this is Dixie McCall, the head nurse for emergency here in Rampart."

The two women shook hands.

"You're not here as patients, are you?" Dixie asked.

"I'm afraid so," Jim told her. "Jean caught this almost a week ago, Jimmy's had it for two days, and then I started coming down with it yesterday. It's bad enough that Jean and I decided we'd better at least get Jimmy to a doctor. We had an appointment with our own doctor this afternoon, but there was some kind of mix-up and we couldn't get in after all. We decided to bring him in here."

"Well, I'm sure we can take care of him," Dixie said. "I think Dr. Early is free right now."

She called Dr. Joe Early over and explained the situation to him. Then, while he took Jimmy into a treatment room accompanied by Jean, Dixie got Jim started on filling out the necessary paperwork at the admittance desk. She was just turning to go back to the nurse's station when she noticed that Jennifer Caley had followed her.

"Isn't your shift ended, Jennifer?" Dixie asked.

"Yeah, about half an hour ago." Jennifer sounded annoyed. "I have a date, and he was supposed to pick me up right after my shift ended. A few of the other girls warned me about him, but he seemed like a nice guy to me. Maybe they were right."

"Oh?" Dixie asked. "Who is this fellow?"

"John Gage," Jennifer replied. "Do you think he's the sort to stand me up?"

"John Gage?" Dixie repeated. "No way. He wouldn't stand a girl up once he got a date with her. Have you tried calling him?"

Jennifer nodded. "About fifteen minutes ago. He didn't answer, so I thought he must be on his way. Surely, it couldn't take him this long to get here."

"That's strange," Dixie said.

Jim hadn't been able to help overhearing. He recognized the name John Gage at once – the paramedic from that accident yesterday who had thought that the hit-and-run had actually been intentional. It was a strange coincidence that he now seemed to be missing. Unless – it wasn't a coincidence.


	6. Missing

J.M.J.

 _A/N: I'm back a couple days early! Thank you for continuing to read and for your patience while I was gone! Thank you also for following and/or favoriting! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp for your review on chapter 5! I really appreciate your support!_

Chapter VI

Missing

Pete wasn't sure why he was doing this. It was a job for detectives, if it was a job for anybody at all. Most likely it was nothing and none of anybody's business. Besides, he'd just gotten off his shift, which had lasted an extra two hours, as it had been a busy shift and there had been a lot of paperwork to wrap up. He would much rather just go home to bed.

On the other hand, he couldn't deny that he was more than a bit curious about this case. The accident had been odd, but strange things happened in vehicle accidents all the time, many of them stranger than this. It was just an instinct of some kind that told him there was more to this one than a simple accident. Then, Jim had called him and told him that, by coincidence, his path had almost again crossed that of one of the paramedics who had been at the accident, John Gage. It was only "almost" because Gage had missed a date, something which, Jim had learned, was completely out of character for him. Jim had called Pete to ask him to help him track down Gage's whereabouts, as Jim had a feeling that this was no coincidence. But Jim was sick with the flu and had a sick wife and a sick two-year-old, so Pete had insisted he would look into it himself so that Jim would stay home.

He was starting to regret it now. After all, it was none of his business if a guy he didn't even know missed a date with a nurse Pete didn't know. There could be any number of explanations for it, all much less melodramatic than Jim seemed to think, and it would be humiliating for Pete to discover that it was one of those. Moreover, as he had been thinking all along, this was a job for detectives, who wouldn't even be investigating it yet, since there was no evidence that anything had happened.

Still, Pete had said he'd do it, and the job was half-done anyway. He'd gotten Gage's address and phone number from the police report and tried calling him. There had been no answer, so he had driven to Gage's apartment building. Pete was sitting in his car in front of the building, making up a story that would sound less ridiculous in case it turned out Gage was there after all. Then he climbed up the stairs and knocked on the door. No answer.

Pete knocked again, louder this time, but still there wasn't even a sound from the apartment. The door of the apartment across the hall cracked open, and a young woman looked out.

"Could you please be quiet?" she requested in a sleepy, annoyed tone. "Do you realize what time it is?"

Pete was well aware that it was the middle of the night. It was part of the reason that this whole thing was so unappealing to him. Even so, all he said was, "Sorry for waking you up. Do you know the man who lives in this apartment?"

"Yeah." The woman gave him a curious look as she woke up a little more. "What do you want with him?"

"I'm Officer Malloy of the LAPD." Pete took out his identification to show her. "Mr. Gage was a witness to a crime yesterday. I need to talk to him about it. Do you know where he is?"

"I'm not any kind of a nosy neighbor, if that's what you're thinking," the woman replied. "I don't keep tabs on everybody. Although I guess I did notice that Johnny hasn't been home all day. Maybe he got called in for work. He's a fireman, you see."

"Thanks for your help," Pete said and went back to his car.

Gage getting called in for work was one of the possibilities Pete had thought of earlier. Of course, that didn't explain why he hadn't called his date to cancel, but there could be reasons for that, too. Maybe he tried calling, but the nurse was already at work herself and nobody had gotten the message to her. Then the big flaw in the theory hit Pete. Jim had said that the emergency staff at Rampart Hospital didn't know anything about Gage's whereabouts. If he had been on duty, he would have been in there several times that day, unless he'd gotten no calls at all that day, which wasn't likely. Perhaps Jim had a point that there was something strange going on here.

Pete drove back to his apartment. Whatever was going on, there wasn't anything more he could do about it tonight. He'd keep thinking about it tonight and see if he had any answers in the morning.

/

"Morning, Roy," Mike Stoker greeted Roy as he walked past him out of the kitchen early in the morning.

"Morning," Roy replied in a subdued tone. He had thought about trading his shift today with one of the paramedics from the other two shifts. The accident was still weighing heavily on his mind, and he wasn't too excited about having to drive the squad today. He'd already made up his mind that he'd let Johnny drive today.

Yesterday had been a long day. After he had told Joanne about the accident, she had spent the rest of the day trying to convince him that it wasn't his fault. He had to admit that he knew that it wasn't. The other driver had been the one who had been speeding, had run the stop sign, and had made the whole awful situation worse by driving off. Roy couldn't have stopped him from doing any of that. But still, even if his part in the incident had been completely accidental, it didn't absolve him from the guilt he was feeling about it.

Roy poured himself a cup of coffee. Nobody else was in the kitchen at the moment. That was just as well. He didn't want to talk about it any more than he needed to. Of course, Johnny would insist on talking about it. He'd probably still be going on about his idea that it had been intentional. Then also, if it was too obvious that something was on Roy's mind, Captain Stanley would probably eventually call him into his office to talk about it. If he was lucky, maybe the others either wouldn't notice or wouldn't say anything. At least, he could have some peace from them.

Roy glanced up at the clock on the wall. It was time for roll call. He grabbed his hat out of the locker behind the squad and then lined up with Chet, Marco, and Mike in front of the squad. When Captain Stanley came out of the office, he gave the four men a questioning look.

"Where's Gage?" Cap asked.

"I haven't seen him this morning, Cap," Chet told him.

"His Rover's not out back, either," Marco added.

Cap frowned. It wasn't like any of the men on his shift to be late. When Johnny got there, he'd be in for a lecture. Besides, Cap had several drills planned for today and he wanted Squad 51 to go out on fire inspections. And, of course, most importantly, Cap couldn't afford to only have half his paramedic team there in case a call came in before Johnny arrived.

Biting back his annoyance, Cap went through roll call. John still hadn't arrived by the time it was over, so Cap called his apartment. There was no answer. As he hung up the phone, he glanced toward the door of his office and saw that the men were still hanging around there, curious about this unusual turn of events.

"Marco, go see if John's arriving right now," Cap said. "If he's not, I'll have to call Dispatch."

Marco trotted to the vehicle bay behind the station. There was still no sign of Johnny's Rover, and so he hurried back to report this to Cap.

While Cap called Dispatch to explain that half of Squad 51 had failed to come into work that morning, Roy crossed his arms and leaned against the squad, wondering what was going on with his partner. Johnny cared a lot about his job, and while he'd cut it fairly close arriving on time now and then, he'd certainly never been this late. It was strange, to say the least.

"Did any of you hear from John at all yesterday?" Cap broke into Roy's thoughts.

Each of the men replied in the negative.

"He had that presentation at the elementary school yesterday," Chet spoke up. "He probably messed up so much that he crawled in a hole and isn't going to come out again."

"Thank you for that suggestion, Kelly." Cap couldn't keep a trace of irritation out of his voice.

"Can you find out if he showed up for that, Cap?" Roy asked. It was just a feeling, but there was something not right about all of this. He'd feel better about it if they could learn something that would indicate that there was nothing wrong with Johnny.

"I'll call the school." Cap reached for the phone as he was talking. A brief conversation confirmed that that John had indeed been at the school the day before. Cap leaned back in his chair with a sigh. He'd need to prepare a very stiff lecture for whenever Johnny decided to show up, not to mention call for another paramedic to fill in for John's shift.

Even with the school's affirmation that Johnny had not missed his presentation, Roy still couldn't understand what was keeping John.

/

Johnny stirred and realized that the sun was coming in through the window of the small shack. It had been an uncomfortable, and Johnny had only dozed here and there, but fortunately his kidnapper had not tried to harm him in any way. The man had done a great deal of shouting and threatening, but he had done nothing to carry those threats out.

The first thing Johnny noticed as he woke up fully was that the kidnapper was gone. Johnny strained against the ropes that were binding him. This looked like a perfect opportunity to escape if he was being left alone, if even only for a few moments. The ropes were tied too tightly. John couldn't loosen them.

It had only been a few minutes when the kidnapper returned. He glanced at Johnny and then checked the bonds to make sure his prisoner had not made any progress to escape.

"You're not feeling any more cooperative this morning, are you?" the man asked.

Johnny didn't bother to return. Nothing he said seemed to help his situation at all.

"Oh well." The kidnapper shrugged. "You haven't saved me any time after all, but no matter. I'll find the others on my own. I'll keep you around for the time being, though. If this goes wrong, I might need some leverage."


	7. Police Reports

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read this story, and particularly for following and/or favoriting it! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp and Julie for your reviews on chapter 6!_

Chapter VII

Police Reports

"Hi, Roy. Where's Johnny?" Dixie McCall greeted Roy.

It was mid-morning by now, and Roy and the paramedic filling in for Johnny, Art Wicket, had just brought a patient into Rampart. The young woman had gotten into a minor fender bender and had a few cuts and bruises but was otherwise all right. Dixie's question brought back to the forefront one of the major problems that were on Roy's mind that day – Johnny's inexplicable absence.

"I don't know," Roy said. "He didn't show up for work today. Cap tried to call him, but he didn't answer."

"That's funny," Dixie replied, thinking back to last night. "You know, I was here last night. Jennifer Caley, one of the new nurses, told me that she had a date with Johnny, but he never showed up."

"That doesn't sound like him," Roy commented, frowning. He had already had a feeling that John's failure to come to work indicated that something was wrong. Dixie's news only reinforced that.

"There was a police officer, Jim Reed, here last night," Dixie continued. "He was off-duty, but he overheard what Jennifer said. He was pretty interested in what she had to say. He said something about Johnny being a witness to an accident."

"Right." Roy nodded. "Reed was one of the officers at the accident yesterday. It was hit-and-run, and Johnny had convinced himself that it was intentional."

Later, back at the station, Roy couldn't help but worry that something had happened to Johnny. He'd now missed a work shift and a date – neither of which were normal for him – and no one seemed to know where he had been since giving the presentation at the school the day before.

As if he had read Roy's mind, Captain Stanley came and leaned on the table where Roy was sitting. The engine had been out on a run since earlier that morning, and this was the first time Cap had had a chance to talk to Roy since roll call. "Have you heard from John at all today?"

"No, and I was talking to Dixie at the hospital," Roy said and explained what Dixie had told him.

Cap knit his brows in concern. He didn't like this at all. "Do you know any of John's friends or neighbors who might know where he is?"

Roy shook his head slowly. "No, apart from the other guys in the fire department and a few of the people in the hospital. One of them might know something."

"Do you think we ought to go to the police?" Cap asked bluntly. "It might be jumping to conclusions, but from what Dixie told you, it sounds like they might already have some interest in what's going on."

"I'm starting to think we should," Roy said. Of course, doing that would make it seem more definite that something had happened to Johnny, but Roy also needed to do something about it besides just wonder and worry. He stood up. "I'll try calling him one more time, just to make sure he hasn't gone home."

Roy dialed the number and waited for an answer, but none came. He glanced at Cap, about to report this, but the alarm went off before he could say a word.

"Squad 51, unknown injury, sixteen-sixteen North Leon Street, time out eleven-oh-three," the dispatcher's voice blared over the speaker.

"I'll call the police and tell you what they say when you get back," Cap told Roy before acknowledging the call.

Roy nodded as he dashed to the squad, climbing into the passenger seat. Art could drive. At least that would be one less thing on Roy's mind.

/

"The vehicle has been parked here since yesterday afternoon, at least," Dave Serrent was explaining to Pete Malloy and his temporary partner, Officer Harold Jackson. "I don't know exactly when whoever left here did so, but if you could move it, I'd really appreciate it."

The three men were standing in the parking lot of the elementary school where Serrent was principal. He had called the police about an abandoned vehicle in the school parking lot, and Pete and Jackson had been the ones to respond.

"I'm afraid we can't do that," Pete explained to Serrent. "There are no signs posted in this parking lot designating this as a tow-away zone. All we can do is tag it as an abandoned vehicle and wait twenty-four hours to see if it's moved. If not, then we can tow it, but we can't do anything before that."

The answer clearly didn't satisfy Serrent, who grumbled something unhappily, but there wasn't much else Pete or Jackson could do. Jackson filled out the information for the tag while Pete radioed the dispatcher to request the DMV information on the Rover in question. He frowned as the information came back – the Rover was registered to John Gage and the address matched the one Pete had gone to the night before looking for Gage.

"Something wrong, Pete?" Jackson asked as he walked back to the police car, filling in the last lines of report that went along with the tag.

"Maybe." Pete glanced at his watch. "It's just about time for seven. Let's get back to the station." He turned to the principal again. "If the vehicle isn't moved in twenty-four hours, Mr. Serrent, we'll send a tow truck out to remove it."

"Well, I guess if that's all the more you can do," Serrent grumbled.

The two officers climbed back into the patrol car and pulled out of the parking lot. Jackson reached for the radio mic to clear them, but he paused before he spoke into it.

"You sure you want to go to the station for seven?" he asked. "I can think of a dozen places off the top of my head that are better than the canned soup you get out of that vending machine."

"I need to talk to Mac about something," Pete insisted. "You can eat at one of those dozen better places tomorrow."

"You're all heart," Jackson replied, but he picked up the mic and requested seven at the station.

Fortunately, the dispatcher okayed the request immediately, and they arrived back at the station shortly. While Jackson headed for the break room to get a can of soup from the vending machine he had complained about, Pete headed straight for Sergeant MacDonald's office.

"You got a minute, Mac?" Pete asked, opening the glass door into the sergeant's office.

"I never really do," Mac replied, "but what's on your mind, Pete?"

"This is going to sound kind of strange," Pete admitted, "but I think it's something we should look into." He then went on to explain who John Gage was, Gage's theory about the hit-and-run a couple days earlier, the fact that Gage seemed to be missing, and the strange circumstance of Gage's Rover apparently being abandoned in the school parking lot.

Mac listened with interest to the account. "I think Sergeant Lennox is working on that hit-and-run. I'll give him a call and see if he thinks this is worth looking into. In fact, I'll do it right now if you want to hear what he says, Pete."

He picked up the phone and dialed the number of the detective sergeant while Pete waited. The conversation only lasted a few minutes, but it was very informative for each of the officers.

When Mac hung up, he took a moment or two to think about what he had just learned. "Lennox wants to talk to you, Pete, and Reed, too. It sounds like there might be something to Reed's theory that Gage has met with trouble."

"Why do you say that?" Pete asked.

"A Captain Stanley from the fire department just called missing persons a few minutes ago to report that one of his paramedics didn't show up for work this morning and can't be reached an nobody seems to know where he is," Mac explained.

"Gage?" Pete guessed.

"Right," Mac confirmed. "The twenty-four hours for a missing persons case isn't quite up yet, but Lennox wants to get on this right away. If that hit-and-run was homicide and now one of the key witnesses is missing –"

"Yeah," Pete interrupted. "I'll get right down to talk to Lennox."

/

Johnny was finally starting to make some progress on untying the ropes binding his wrists. His kidnapper had left him alone hours ago, and Johnny had had all that time to try to get loose. He hadn't been able to reach anything that could help him cut through the ropes, so all he could do was strain at them and hope that the knots would loosen. His arms were sore and aching, but he thought the ropes weren't as tight as they had been.

He took a minute or two to rest, but then got back to work. No doubt that maniac would be back sooner or later, and whenever that happened, Johnny wanted to be sure he was gone from here. Gritting his teeth against the pain as the ropes chafed against his already raw wrists, he strained once again against the bonds. To his relief, his hand came nearly halfway through the ropes. He didn't want to waste this bit of encouragement, and he pulled his arm even harder. The ropes slipped off.

Johnny allowed himself a few seconds' exultation at his newfound freedom. Then his thoughts came back to reality right away. He was up in the hills with no transportation since the kidnapper had driven away and no way to call for help, as Johnny hadn't seen a telephone anywhere in the shack. It would be a long walk back to the main highway, and if he walked along the road, the kidnapper might spot him. On the other hand, if he didn't walk along the road, he wouldn't know which way to go. This was going to take some thought.

The first step, obviously, was to untie his ankles. While he was doing so, he noticed that his efforts to free himself had rubbed his wrists so raw that they were bleeding, so the next thing he did was look around for any kind of a first aid kit. The shack seemed to have nothing but the bare necessities, but Johnny did find a kit with some gauze bandages, which he wrapped around his wrists.

While he worked at this, he kept his ears open for the sound of the kidnapper's car returning as well as continuing to think about what he needed to do next. Clearly, he needed to get out of the shack. After that, he thought the best thing to do would be to find a place outside to hide. It was risky, of course – the kidnapper would start looking for him as soon as he realized his prisoner was gone. On the other hand, stealing the kidnapper's car would be his best bet.

He was just finishing bandaging his wrists when he heard a car drive up. Johnny froze for a fraction of a second, and then made a dash for the back door, trying to be as quiet as he could. He couldn't let himself be captured a second time.


	8. A Horrible Dilemma

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you so much for reading and possibly following or favoriting! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp for your review on chapter 7! Your support means a lot to me!_

Chapter VIII

A Horrible Dilemma

As Squad 51 pulled up in front of 1616 North Leon Street, Roy DeSoto and Art Wicket exchanged puzzled glances. The address was a vacant lot.

"Maybe they gave the wrong number," Art ventured to guess.

"Or they meant to say 'avenue' or 'boulevard' instead of 'street,'" Roy suggested.

Art picked up the mic for the radio. "I guess all we can do is ask for a callback to check the address. If they did give a wrong number, it could be somewhere around here. Why don't you go knock on some doors while I check the address? I'll hit the horn if we're on the wrong street altogether."

Roy nodded and opened the door to the squad. He made his way to the nearest house and knocked on the door.

Meanwhile, Art requested the callback. It only took a moment for the dispatcher to give a reply: "The callback number is nonexistent."

"Can't give their phone number or their address right," Art muttered. Well, if Roy couldn't find out anything from knocking on doors, there wouldn't be anything they could do.

No one had answered Roy's knock at the first house he tried, so he went on to the next one, which had a covered porch. He glanced over his shoulder toward the squad as he waited for someone to answer the door, wondering whether Art had learned anything or not, but he couldn't see the squad from here. A moment later, the door opened a crack, and Roy could see a man peering out.

"I'm from the LA County Fire Department," Roy explained, gesturing toward his badge. "Is everything all right?"

"It's getting better," the man replied.

"Excuse me?" Roy asked in bewilderment at the strange response.

Instead of explaining what he had meant, the man opened the door wider. Now Roy could see that he was holding a gun in his hand. Roy took a step back in alarm.

"What is this?" he asked, unable to think of anything else to say.

"This is about a hit-and-run 'accident' the other day," the man said.

It only took a moment for Roy to figure out the rest of what was going on from this revelation. "You were the driver."

"That's right." The man waved his gun in a gesture for Roy to come in through the door. Seeing the barrel of the gun pointed at him, Roy didn't think he had much other choice. "I was a little concerned it would be that other paramedic instead of you who would come to the door, but I figured if that happened, I could just send him on his way and try again later. It wasn't that much of a risk after all."

"So, you're the one who called in the unknown injury," Roy concluded.

The man nodded. "It's a pretty simple thing to get the fire department to come to you, you know. Now I've only got those two cops to worry about. Maybe you'll be more helpful in tracking them down than your buddy has been."

At those words, Roy's heart sank. So, that was why Johnny hadn't turned up that morning. Roy had been suspecting some kind of trouble, but nothing like this. "You haven't hurt him?"

"Not yet," the man said. "I'm not going to try to make you believe that I'm not going to hurt him, and you, for that matter. The whole point of this is to keep you two and those cops from talking, possibly identifying me. The only reason I'm putting off the inevitable is because I need you two to help me find those cops. See, the police department puts the number of the unit on the top, not all handy and visible on the side like the fire department. Besides that, the police car was too far away for me to see the number even if it had been on the side. So, I wasn't able to find out who the cops were as easily as I could find out who the two firemen were."

Roy didn't reply to this. It was obvious this man was unbalanced. Trying to reason with him wouldn't do any good, and it might antagonize him. Roy couldn't risk him changing his mind and deciding he didn't need Roy's help after all. Even more importantly, he needed to find out where this fellow was keeping Johnny.

"Of course," the man went on, speaking as if he had an ace up his sleeve, "I realize that knowing what your fate is to be whether you cooperate or not may not be the most encouraging for you to cooperate. Because of that, I've decided that I need some additional leverage. I know you have a wife and two kids. Nothing needs to happen to them if you just tell me the names of the two cops. That's all I need – just the names. I can figure the rest out from there. I'll even give you time to think it over. In fact, you can talk it over with your pal. I'm sure the two of you can make a reasonable decision."

Roy flinched at this. The whole situation was bad enough without Joanne and the kids being dragged into it. Roy knew he had to protect them no matter what, but he couldn't in good conscience give this lunatic the names of the two officers. Doing that would be as much as signing their death warrants. It was a horrible dilemma.

/

Pete had accompanied Detective Sergeant Lennox to Fire Station 51 to get more details on John Gage's disappearance. Considering Pete's involvement in the case already, Lennox had requested Mac to let Pete work with him on it, and if it wasn't cleared up by the time Jim Reed came back on duty, to bring him in on it as well. Mac had agreed, recognizing how valuable the two officers' involvement in the investigation could be.

Right now they were talking to Captain Stanley in the kitchen area. The paramedic unit was out on a call, but the three other firemen from the engine company were staying close by, interested in what was going on. The conversation didn't particularly reveal anything new, and Sergeant Lennox was starting to wrap it up when the phone rang. Mike Stoker went to answer it in the captain's office. He was back a moment later.

"Cap, it's the battalion chief," he said. "He wants to talk to you."

Stanley raised his eyebrows, wondering what the battalion chief wanted now. He excused himself to go answer the phone.

"I don't suppose any of you fellows have any light to shed on all this?" Lennox turned to the three remaining firemen.

"The captain knows as much as any of us do," Chet replied. "DeSoto's the only one who might know more, but he didn't seem like it this morning."

Lennox glanced at his watch. "We'll wait a little longer and see if he gets back. Otherwise, we'll just have to come back later."

Cap's phone call took several minutes. When he returned, he looked concerned. "This is not a good day for paramedics, apparently. Art Wicket called in to Dispatch, who turned it over to the chief. The address on that call was a vacant lot, so Roy went to knock on some doors and see if he could learn anything while Art got a callback on the number. Now he can't find Roy anywhere."

/

The door slammed behind Johnny as he darted through it. He winced. He hadn't meant to close it that hard. Nobody would have heard, at least. The car was just pulling up in front now. The noise of the engine would have blocked out the door slamming.

Now Johnny had to make another choice. He'd taken too long leaving the shack, and now he was cornered. For the moment, he was hidden behind the shack, and the kidnapper couldn't see him. However, the second the kidnapper walked through the front door, he'd realize that his prisoner had escaped. Johnny could make a dash for the nearest cover then and take a chance at being too late, or he could make a dash now and take a chance at being seen. He looked around him for what the nearest cover would be. The desert landscape didn't offer much. There was a small clump of trees about two hundred fifty yards away, and otherwise there was only the small dips and falls of the land itself. This wasn't going to be easy.

He held back, deciding to wait. At least it would take the kidnapper a few minutes to find him that way, rather than the seconds that running for it now would give him. He heard the car doors open – two doors. Then he heard a man's voice speaking to someone. So, more than one person had arrived in the car. In that case, either this wasn't the kidnapper at all or he had help. Johnny decided he'd better find out which it was right away. He peered around the corner of the shack just enough to see. When he caught a glance of who was with the kidnapper, his heart sank. It was Roy.


	9. A Suspect

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who is reading, and to everyone who has followed and/or favorited this story! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp and Julie for your reviews on chapter 8!_

Chapter IX

A Suspect

When he saw the kidnapper bringing Roy here, Johnny almost forgot to duck back behind the corner of the building. Fortunately, he remembered before he was spotted. He leaned against the wall, trying to think through this rapidly. He had an even bigger decision to make now, and even less time to make it. Should he still try to escape and leave Roy behind to face the consequences or should he let himself be recaptured, and who knew what happen to either of them then?

There was a sudden, angry shout from inside the shack. Clearly, the kidnapper realized that his prisoner had escaped now. Johnny's mind was suddenly made up. He would try to escape, and maybe while the kidnapper was trying to catch him, Roy would have time to get away. Without another moment's hesitation, Johnny made a dash for the clump of trees.

As soon as he reached them, he threw himself on the ground behind them, and then carefully looked back to see what was going on with the kidnapper. The man had come out of the shack and was looking wildly around. Clearly, he hadn't spotted Johnny – yet. Johnny looked around him for where his next piece of cover might be. The nearest cover seemed to be a small rise in the ground, about a dozen yards away. It wouldn't take Johnny long to cover that, but it could be long enough for him to be spotted.

He glanced back toward the shack. The kidnapper had disappeared from view, either around the other side of the building or back inside it. John shuddered at what his plan inside might be, but he couldn't think about that right now. This was his chance to get to the next piece of cover. Taking a deep breath, he ran for it. He covered the distance swiftly and had almost made it to the cover when a gunshot made him stop in his tracks. He turned around slowly and saw the kidnapper once again outside the shack, holding Roy by the arm with one hand and his gun with the other.

"If you want what's good for your friend here, you'll turn around and come right back," the kidnapper challenged him.

There was nothing to be done about it now. Drooping a bit with defeat, Johnny retuned to the kidnapper, how shoved him roughly back inside, dragging Roy along as well.

"All right," the man said, pointing his gun at Roy. "You sit down, and your pal here will tie you up. Then I'll tie him up. Got it?"

Johnny and Roy exchanged glances and by silent agreement, determined not to make any response other than to nod. The kidnapper threw a piece of rope at Johnny, which he then proceeded to use to bind Roy's hands. He thought the kidnapper would probably check his knots once he was done tying John up, but just in case, Johnny only tied the rope tight enough so that it would look good. Then the kidnapper stuck his gun in his belt and prepared to tie Johnny's wrists. For a moment, John thought about trying to jump him, but he could easily imagine how that might go wrong. Maybe if Roy was still free – but Johnny doubted that Roy could get himself loose that fast. Resignedly, Johnny allowed his hands to be bound, wincing as the kidnapper pulled the ropes tight around his raw wrists. At least, the villain hadn't forced him to take the bandages off.

"Looks like you had a hard time getting loose," the kidnapper commented, noticing the bandages. "Maybe you'll think twice before you try it again." As John had expected, he looked over Roy's bonds and tightened them considerably. Then he sat down at the table and picked up a handheld two-way radio, but he didn't turn it on.

Roy was the one who finally broke the silence. "Sorry about that, Johnny. Are you all right?"

"Yeah," Johnny replied, grumbling. "Are you?"

"So far," Roy said.

"What about that deal I mentioned before we came up here?" the kidnapper spoke up at last. "You think that over at all, DeSoto?"

"What deal?" Johnny asked, not liking the sound of this at all.

"Just something between DeSoto and me," the kidnapper replied. "It's not any of your concern. Well, DeSoto, what are you thinking? You want to take me up on it?"

Roy had done a lot of thinking about it – in fact, he'd done little else but think of this man's threat against his family since he had first been captured. He had been terrified by it at first, but now he was starting to think that it was all a bluff. The whole point of this man's scheme was to keep the witnesses of his crime from talking. Would he really risk more crimes than he had to – and having more witnesses? Roy didn't think so.

"Well?" the kidnapper asked. "I'm waiting."

"You know," Roy said, trying to pick just the right words that would be the most persuasive, "I don't think this is a very good deal for you. It's a lot of risk, and you don't really get anything out of it. If I don't talk, and then you – do that, it's not going to change my mind."

"But there's three of them," the kidnapper pointed out. "What if I picked them off one at a time?"

"I don't think you could do that," Roy said, trying hard to keep his voice even. "That would be riskier than anything else you've tried so far."

It didn't take Johnny long to figure out what they were talking about. "This guy threatened your family?" he asked Roy in mingled disgust and surprise.

Neither Roy nor the kidnapper answered. Instead, the kidnapper said, "Well, there are other ways of getting you to talk."

"For what?" Johnny demanded, furious after learning about the man's threat. "All you want are the names of the two cops. Why go to all this bother for that?"

"And if it's so little, why don't you just tell me?" the kidnapper countered.

Johnny was about to argue further, but Roy had an idea and interrupted him. "Could we talk about this between the two of us?"

"So you can plan something?" the kidnapper asked suspiciously.

"We just want to talk about what our best option is," Roy replied.

"I guess. Go ahead," the kidnapper said, but he didn't back off. Instead, Roy and John had to drop their voices.

"We can't give him the names, Roy," Johnny protested. "The guy's out of his head. He wants to kill them."

"And us, too," Roy reminded him. "I don't want to give him the names, but how far would it really get him?"

"He found us just by having the number of our unit," Johnny pointed out.

"Okay," Roy admitted, "but what if we don't give him their real names?"

"He'll figure it out and then kill us." Johnny sighed. "But I think that's what he's planning to do, anyway."

"He might even leave us alone while he goes out and looks for them," Roy said. "That could give us a chance to escape."

"All right," Johnny agreed. "Let's try it."

"We made up our minds," Roy said more loudly.

"You'll give me the names, then?" the kidnapper asked.

"Arthurs and Liesel," Roy replied, making up names that didn't sound too improbable but hopefully there weren't any real police officers with those names.

"Great," the kidnapper said, setting the radio on the table. "I won't need this, then. I was thinking I'd call the police and tell them they'd have to surrender those two officers if they wanted you two back alive, but that wouldn't work so well most likely. Now I won't need to take the chance. I'll keep you two around in case something goes wrong and I need leverage after all, but I'd better make sure you don't escape this time."

He went to a cupboard and pulled out a roll of duct tape. Then he grabbed the back of Johnny's chair and pulled him farther away from Roy. Once that was done, he used the duct tape to secure their wrists more and to bind their ankles and legs to the legs of the chairs. As a finishing touch, he tore off two more pieces of tape and put one of each of their mouths.

"This way, you can't try to make any sort of plans," the kidnapper explained. "I'll be back. You'd better be here when I come."

/

Jim was feeling a little better that afternoon, although he still couldn't get the possible murder case off his mind. He decided that it couldn't hurt for a change of scenery to go for a short walk around the area where the "accident" had happened. Maybe he'd see something that would remind him of something he hadn't particularly noticed that day.

The neighborhood was just as quiet as it had been the day of the "accident". The only difference was that it was a Saturday, and a few kids were playing in their front yards. Otherwise, the neighborhood appeared to be sleepy and dull.

One place that Jim made a point of walking past was the victim's former home. Jim recalled that the victim had been named Roger Winfall and had lived near the scene of the accident. When he came to the address, he saw that it was a large, upper-middle-class house. He stopped to look at it for a few minutes.

As he was looking, a woman walked past and evidently noticed his interest. "You're not looking for Roger Winfall, are you?" she asked.

"No," Jim replied. "Actually, I'm a police officer. You've heard about the accident, right?"

"Oh, certainly," the woman said. "Except I don't think it was any accident. Of course, it's none of my business –"

"No," Jim told her. "If you have anything that can help us out with the investigation, we want to hear about it."

"Oh, well, I could tell you a few things," the woman replied.

Jim took a pad of paper and a pencil from his pocket. "I'd like to write this down. Could you give me your name, ma'am?"

"Mrs. Elizabeth Sandberg," the woman replied. "I live just a few houses down the street."

"Why do you think it wasn't an accident?" Jim asked.

"Oh, well." Mrs. Sandberg seemed a little hesitant to say. "You see, I was never a close friend of Mr. Winfall's. He wasn't the easiest neighbor to get along with. But I made it a point to take a meal to each of the bachelors and widowers on this street at least once a month – with no woman to cook for them, most of them just eat canned food all the time – and Mr. Winfall wasn't an exception. I don't think he had many friends, because every now and then, he'd want me to stick around and talk to him. One day, he told me that he had a nephew who was no good and had it out for him. He had tried to kill him once, and that was why Mr. Winfall moved out here to Los Angeles."

"So, you think this nephew killed him?" Jim inquired.

"I do," Mrs. Sandberg replied. "Just a couple of days before Mr. Winfall was killed, I took a meal to him. He told me that he'd heard his nephew had bought a place up in the hills, and he'd been seeing him around the neighborhood. I told him to go to the police, but he didn't listen, and then just a couple of days later, he gets killed. It sounds pretty suspicious to me."

Jim jotted down Mrs. Sandberg's story excitedly. Finally, there was some clue to what had happened. "Did he tell you the nephew's name, Mrs. Sandberg?"

"He did," the woman said. "The fellow's name is Lester Wording."


	10. A Hazardous Deal

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Thank you all so much for continuing to read this story! Thank you if you have favorited and/or followed this story! Thank you especially to AllTrekkedUp for your review on chapter 9! We're almost to the end of the story now._

Chapter X

A Hazardous Deal

Detective Sergeant Lennox nodded as he listened to Jim Reed explain what he had learned from Mrs. Sandberg. Pete Malloy was also in the room, listening to the story.

"Do you think Wording could be our boy, Sarge?" Pete asked.

"It's a good lead," Lennox said, "and it's the only lead we have right now. I'll get some of my boys on tracking down this Lester Wording right away." He was about to pick up his phone to make a call, but before he could, it began to ring. "Lennox here," he said into it as he answered it. A strange expression crossed his face as he listened. "Okay. Put him on." He listened for a minute or two longer, and then he said, "All right. I see. I'll put one of them on, but it'll take just a minute. Can you hold on?" He took the receiver away from his mouth and covered it with his hand.

"What's going on?" Pete asked.

"Reed, get someone to trace this call," Lennox requested. As Jim went to do as he was told, Lennox explained to Pete in a low voice, "There's a man on the phone. He won't give his name. He says he's holding Gage and DeSoto, and he'll kill them if we don't let him talk to Arthurs or Liesel."

"Who are Arthurs and Liesel?" Pete inquired.

Lennox shrugged. "I have no idea, but he seems to think they're cops. Just from talking on the phone, he seems a little unbalanced to me. I suspect he might not know what he's talking about. How would you like to play either Arthurs or Liesel? We just need someone to talk to him and keep him busy while we trace this call."

"Sure, I'll give it a try," Pete agreed. Lennox handed the phone to him, and Pete said into it, "Arthurs. What can I do for you?"

"Are you one of the cops who was there when old Roger Winfall got what was coming to him?" a man's voice asked.

"Do you mean the accident?" Pete countered.

"Don't give me that," the caller retorted. "You know as well as I do that it wasn't any accident. Were you there?"

"Yes," Pete said in all honesty.

"Good. And the other cop – Liesel – is he around?" the caller asked next.

"My partner's here," Pete replied, again honestly.

"Okay, then here's the deal," the caller said. "I'm tired of waiting around. I want you and your partner to meet me someplace so we can talk about that so-called accident. If you wanna see those two firemen alive, you'd better do it."

"Can't we talk about it now?" Pete asked.

"No," the caller told him abruptly. "I want to talk about it in person – you, me, and your partner. Okay? No tricks."

"Right. No tricks," Pete agreed. "Where do you want to meet? And when?"

"There's a place up in the hills," the man said. "I want you to meet me there. No other cops. You got it?"

"Where exactly is this place?" Pete inquired.

The man gave directions and then asked again, "You got it?"

"I've got it," Pete told him.

"Be there in two hours." The man hung up the phone as soon as he said it. Pete relayed the information to Lennox. As he was talking, Jim came back into the room, and Pete filled him in as well.

"There wasn't enough time to trace the call," Lennox commented in disappointment. "At least we've got a place where we can find him, as long as we don't spook him too much. We'll have to send two officers while the rest of us hang back and stay hidden. Do you think he'd recognize you?"

"I don't see how," Pete said. "We were too far away, and in the car. He couldn't have gotten any kind of a look at us."

"There's no point in taking chances, though," Jim argued. "I don't know where his wrong information about the names came from, but what if he somehow found out what Pete and I look like?"

"That doesn't seem like a very good possibility to me," Lennox said, "but if you two want to pose as Arthurs and Liesel anyway, It's fine with me. We'll have to clear it with Mac is all."

Sergeant MacDonald agreed to the plan willingly, and Lennox set out right away to outline the plan. Pete and Jim would take a patrol unit to the address that the man had given them. Lennox and a dozen other officers would follow them at a discreet distance and park out of sight of the address. Then they would continue on foot to surround the suspect. Meanwhile, Pete and Jim would try to find out what the situation was with the hostages. If the hostages were safe, they'd go ahead and capture the man.

The plan worked like clockwork – at first. Pete and Jim arrived just on time, waiting around a bend to give the other officers time to get into place. Then they drove the rest of the way to meet the mysterious caller. He wasn't in sight at first, but there was a rundown shack at the place. A couple of minutes later, the door of the shack opened and a man came out.

"You Arthurs and Liesel?" he asked.

Pete and Jim, who weren't wearing their name tags, nodded.

"What's your name?" Jim asked.

The man looked around as if he suspected this was a trap. "Wording," he said finally, not noticing anything definite amiss. "Are you armed? I want you to put your guns on the ground."

Lennox had anticipated this, so he had had Pete and Jim take the precaution of putting their guns in their belts in back instead of in their holsters.

"Our holsters are empty. See?" Pete tipped the empty holster toward Wording.

"Where are the two firemen?" Jim asked.

"Where do you think they are?" Wording countered vaguely.

"We don't want to play games, Wording," Pete said. "We made a deal. We'd come and meet you here, and you'd let the two firemen go."

Wording laughed sardonically. "I didn't say that. I said you'd 'see them alive.' And you will, you will. For a minute or two."

Pete and Jim exchanged glances. This was not going the way it was supposed to. Jim was tempted to look around to see if he could spot Lennox and the other officers who were hiding nearby, but he knew that would be a foolish move.

Pete was trying to stay in control of the situation. "Where are the firemen?"

"In the shack," Wording finally said. "Come on. I'll show you."

"Is there anyone else in there?" Pete asked.

"Maybe, maybe not," Wording replied. "What do you care?"

It was a dilemma. If Wording was alone, they could take him now easily, and there would probably be no danger or difficulty involved. On the other hand, if he had an accomplice, the accomplice could harm the hostages. If only they knew the whole situation…

Then, without warning and practically out of nowhere, there was a sudden shot. Pete and Jim made a dash for cover as a sudden shower of bullets began.


	11. Capture

J.M.J.

 _A/N: Here it is – the last chapter! Thank you so much for reading this story! Thank you also if you have followed and/or favorited it! Thank you especially to Jo, AllTrekkedUp, and Julie for your reviews on chapter 10 and throughout the story._

 _Julie – as for your question, I'm fairly new to this website, as I've only been on here a little over a year. In that time, I haven't heard of the website deleting any stories. The stories that have disappeared were probably deleted by their author, or maybe the author deleted their account and that, in turn, deleted the stories. Maybe someone else knows what happened._

Chapter XI

Capture

"What do you think this guy is up to?" Johnny asked Roy as they watched their kidnapper going back and forth, in and out of the cabin.

Roy shook his head. "Who knows? We need to get out of here."

Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be any way of doing that. They were bound tight, and the kidnapper was never out of sight long enough for them to escape.

The hours passed slowly like this. Then something even more terrible happened. Johnny and Roy heard a car drive up to the cabin and park. The kidnapper peered out the door, holding his gun, to see who it was. As soon as he saw, he went hurrying out to meet the person.

"Reinforcements," Johnny guessed in defeat.

It was true. Two other men had arrived, both armed and both clearly friends of the kidnapper. These three immediately went into some kind of preparations, completely ignoring the two captives. It was during this time that the paramedics first heard the name of their captor – Lester Wording. However, they also learned some even more interesting things.

"Hey, Les," one of the newcomers said. "Couldn't you have just left it at killing the old man? I mean, asking the police to come here is a little risky, don't you think?"

The other newcomer scoffed. "More than just risky. Downright stupid. I'm glad to help you out in a pinch, Les, but I don't like sticking my neck out this far."

"Aw, quit worrying," Wording told them. "It's worth it. Old Uncle Roger had it coming to him, but I don't plan on getting arrested over him."

"It might be too late," the more concerned of his friends muttered.

"Only if one of you two goof this up," Wording retorted. "Just think about the share of the life insurance you're going to get when this all works out." He looked at his watch. "It's about time now. Dave, you head out and get in position. Give a whistle when you see them coming."

One of his reinforcements – Dave, apparently – took his gun and went out of the cabin. Wording and the other one waited impatiently, looking out the window. After a long wait, they heard a whistle.

"It's time," Wording said. "Get ready, Jack. And if this goes wrong, shoot these two."

With those less than encouraging parting words, Wording went outside to meet an approaching car. It wasn't hard for the captives to guess what was going down. Somehow Wording had arranged to have some police officers – the ones who had witnessed the "accident", Wording most likely thought – come here, and he intended to ambush them. Johnny strained against the ropes. This was definitely not looking good. The police were undoubtedly planning an ambush of their own. If they grabbed Wording, Jack would kill the prisoners, and even if that didn't happen, Wording would use Johnny and Roy as hostages.

Roy was thinking along the same lines, but he wasn't quite so hopeless. He had a bit of a plan that might at least keep them from being killed right away. He glanced at Johnny in an effort to communicate it, but he had no way of knowing whether his partner understood or not.

Just then, there was the sound of shots. Jack peered out the window to see what was going on. Apparently, he didn't like what he saw, for he cocked his gun and came towards the two prisoners.

/

As soon as the shots rang out, Pete and Jim dove for the cover of their car. They knew that there were shots coming from a different direction than the house, but even though there wasn't much cover, they couldn't tell which direction it was coming from.

Wording was running back toward the cabin. Once he got inside, they might never be able to get him out again. Moreover, that was probably where he had the two firemen, if they were still alive. With this thought in mind, Pete peered out from behind the car and took careful aim at Wording and fired. The man let out a whelp and stumbled. Pete must have hit him in the leg.

Meanwhile, Jim was trying to spot the unknown sniper. As he peered out from the cover of the car, another bullet ripped through the air and drove itself into the car only a few inches from Jim's head. He ducked back, but now he knew the direction the bullets were coming from. Looking carefully, he saw a glint of a rifle from behind a nearby rise in the ground. He fired towards it.

There was a shout from inside the cabin, followed closely by a shot. Pete and Jim exchanged worried glances. Not only was someone firing at them from outside, but there was also someone inside. What was worse, neither of them thought that that shot had been aimed toward them. Had the worst happened inside the cabin?

Even as these thoughts were passing through his head, Jim spotted the outdoor sniper rising up from his cover. Immediately, Jim fired a shot, and he saw the man drop his gun and fall to the ground. Then both officers turned their attention to the cabin and waited tensely. Not a sound came from it.

Lennox arrive a few minutes later. "Is there another one inside?"

"Yeah," Pete told him, "but we don't know what's going on in there."

Just then, there was another shout from inside.

/

As Jack approached them, leveling his gun at them, Roy glanced anxiously at Johnny, trying to see some sign that his partner was guessing what Roy planned to do. Obviously, he couldn't tell. In that case, Roy would just have to do this himself.

"I guess I've got to do this now," Jack said, sounding a little unwilling.

That was good. He wasn't as crazy as Wording. Roy waited a second longer to see if he had any more time. He probably didn't. Jack was raising his gun. Gritting his teeth, Roy stood up as well as he could tied to the chair and butted his head into Jack's stomach. Jack, taken completely by surprise, staggered backwards and fell, hitting his head hard against the floor. The gun went off as it fell.

"Roy!" Johnny shouted, both in surprise and concern.

"I'm all right," Roy assured him. He watched Jack, but the man didn't move. "What happened to the gun?"

Johnny nodded toward one side of the room. "It's over there. What do we do now?"

There was still shooting going on outside, so they decided to stay quiet for the moment. Slowly the shooting died down, and everything became silent outside.

"What do you think?" Roy asked after waiting several minutes.

Johnny craned his neck to try to see out the window, but he could see no sign of movement. "I guess it can't hurt to let them know that this guy's not a threat anymore."

They both shouted the news outside, explaining that they were tied up so they couldn't come to the door to prove it. The police officers were cautious in coming to rescue them, but they finally made their way through the door and untied the prisoners, as well as handcuffing Jack, who was beginning to wake up now.

Wording, Jack, and Dave, all injured in varying degrees, were taken into custody, while another paramedic unit was called in to treat them. Meanwhile, Johnny and Roy recognized Pete Malloy and Jim Reed, the officers who had been at the scene of the "accident".

"Are you guys all right?" Jim asked.

"We are now," Johnny replied, looking at his wrists.

/

"Those wrists should be fine in a couple of days," Dr. Morton told Johnny as they walked out of the emergency room at Rampart. "Come back tomorrow, though, so I can change the bandages."

"Right, Doc," Johnny said. "Thanks."

Roy was standing outside the door, waiting. "Well? What's the diagnosis? Is he going to live?"

"Oh, I think so," Dr. Morton replied. He patted Roy on the shoulder. "I'll see you fellows later."

"I think I'm ready to head home for a nap," Johnny said with a yawn.

"I called Joanne," Roy told him. "She's coming to pick us up."

Just then, Pete and Jim walked up to them.

"How are you doing, Gage?" Pete asked. When Johnny had assured him that he was all right, Pete went on to explain that he and Jim had been among the officers who had brought the three kidnappers in.

"It looks like they're all going to be fine," Jim said.

"Then it sounds like they'll be recovered just in time for the trial," Roy commented.

Just then, Jennifer Caley walked past. If she noticed Johnny, she didn't give any indication of it.

"How long is it before Joanne is coming to pick us up, Roy?" Johnny asked.

"She should be here any minute," Roy replied.

"I just need ten minutes," Johnny said, starting to follow Jennifer. "Just ten minutes."


End file.
